Annual General Meeting 2017

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that the SECOND ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING of the members of the above-named Company will be held at House of Vans London, Arches 228 – 232, Station Approach Road, SE1 8SW at 1.45pm on Thursday 28th September 2017 to transact the following business:

AGENDA

1. To receive and adopt the Minutes of the Annual General Meeting held on Friday 16th September 2016.

2. To receive Statement of Accounts, Balance Sheet and Annual Report.

3. Appointment of Accountants/Auditors and Solicitors for the year.

By Order of the Board of Directors, J.P. HOPE-GILL, Company Secretary.

Report of Activities since September 2016

The biggest challenge faced over the last year has been the lack of resources and thus capacity. This has affected the amount of work we have been able to do which has been frustrating.

With support from Sport England we have worked to develop a business model for Skateboard England which shows we can become sustainable without relying on long term public funding. An application is currently being considered by Sport England to financially support this business plan with staff and programmes.

The work carried out identifies that there are over 530k skateboarders accessing approximately 1,400 skateparks across the country.

Within all the work we have carried out this year, we are very conscious that our role is to support and facilitate the growth of skateboarding. This is the key message to the skateboarding community and its pleasing to see that this is generally accepted and welcomed.

Governance of the company is an area we have worked to improve so that we conform to Sport England’s governance code. This has included appointing two Independent Non-Executive Directors with responsibility for finance and commercial activities.

Following the decision to include skateboarding in the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, we have been working with UK Sport to identify medal potential and see how skaters can be supported. Discussions are still ongoing regarding funding which will give the opportunity to support skaters as well as creating a performance pathway and talent identification programmes.

We have been instrumental in creating Skateboard GB which is the governing body that represents the home nations for Olympic skateboarding and have also supported the set up of the European Skateboarding Association.

The Board agreed to create the National Championships for Park and Street. These events will be held in April 2018 and we are in the process of choosing the appropriate skateparks to host. BBC Sport have agreed to stream the national championships on their website.

We’ve had several meetings regarding facilities, including with Sport England, and started to look at how we look to be strategic and offer support as skateparks are being built or refurbished. This is a long term piece of work but one that is essential if we are to increase the number and quality of parks across the country.

We have supported and given advice to a growing number of different skateparks who are in the process of applying for funding.

Over 120 candidates have now qualified through the Level 1 coaching course, delivered by Sk8 Safe. The qualification is essential to see skateboarding grow, especially if we want to introduce coaching into schools and other organisations.

A group of Masters students from Sheffield Hallam University have undertaken a facilities mapping exercise to identify the distribution of skateparks across England and Wales.

There are a number of partnerships we have created and others we are developing and continuing to work with. We are very conscious that we need to work with other organisations in order to increase participation and can use existing programmes such as Street Games, UK Active ParkLives and the Premier Football League. We are in discussions with them and others about various pilots that will be delivered in due course, using coaches that have qualified through the coaching course.

Following discussions, it is encouraging that at least three cities (Hull, Sheffield and Nottingham) are keen to engage with skateboarding and have committed to resourcing and supporting their local skateboarding communities with support from Skateboard England.

There has then been general daily correspondence with answering queries from individuals, CSP’s, local authorities, skate parks, etc and writing letters of support for funding.